


Henry Tilney and Mr. Norrell

by AMarguerite



Category: AUSTEN Jane - Works, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell & Related Fandoms, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (TV), Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell - Susanna Clarke, Northanger Abbey - Jane Austen
Genre: Catherine's Genre-Savviness Is Very Useful, Crossover, F/M, Fae & Fairies, Feminist Themes, Genre Savvy, M/M, Napoleonic Wars, The Shades of Pemberly are not thus polluted but are pretty pissed off at a future point, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-12-22
Updated: 2018-08-29
Packaged: 2019-02-18 08:37:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13096416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AMarguerite/pseuds/AMarguerite
Summary: Henry Tilney finds himself the second magician in England. He is not terrifically thrilled by this. Especially since it means being shunted off into the army, an institution he has spent four-and-twenty years avoiding, and dealing with Mr. Norrell, who does not appreciate his jokes. Fortunately, Catherine Morland has spent eighteen years training to be a heroine....





	1. The Knight of Wands

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gogollescent](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gogollescent/gifts).



> With many, many thanks to gogollescent for coming up with the idea and allowing me to use it, as well as helping me brainstorm my way through all the changes Henry's being the second magician of the age would entail. Thanks also to pipistrellus, who helped me come up with how Jewish systems of magic would work in this universe.

No one who had ever seen Catherine Morland in her infancy would have supposed her born to be a heroine. Indeed, when a man who looked remarkably like a hedge root started up out of the lane and started screeching loudly about finding the one destined to bring English magic back, neither Catherine nor any of her siblings assumed she was the person mentioned. All turned to look at Catherine Morland‘s fiancé, Henry Tilney.

Any who saw Henry Tilney might not have expected him to be a hero, but he looked much likelier to be a hero than Catherine Morland a heroine. He was about four and twenty, was rather tall, had a pleasing countenance, a very intelligent and lively eye, and, if not quite handsome, was very near it. His address was good, his manners engaging, and his wit very sharp. True, he was a clergyman, rather than the last scion of a noble family, and there was not the least irregularity in his pedigree, any promising strain of madness, or looming tragic flaw to blight his young life, but he had recently quarreled with his father and had grown up in an abbey stolen from monks during the time of Henry VIII.

Clearly, if someone was to be suddenly surprised by their destiny in the middle of a long country walk, it would the very-nearly-cast-off son of General Tilney of Northanger Abbey.

“For ten days I have been walking westward,” said the man who was not actually a hedge root, “in search of one destined to bring John Uskglass his kingdom once again.”

“Have you now,” said Henry, putting an arm before Catherine, and the two or three young Morlands who had been sent as chaperones. “That must have been an... invigorating walk.”

“Ten days ago I was shewn a picture of the man destined to be a great magician.”

It did not occur to anyone that this might not be one and the same person.

“My name is—”

Mr. Tilney’s large Newfoundland puppy, Sampson, also decided that the not-a-hedge-root was talking about his master. Sampson did not like this and so took matters into his own hands.

“AUGH!” exclaimed the man who was not actually a hedge root, as a six-month-old Newfoundland attached itself to his person, by means of sharp teeth.

“Sampson has attacked that man!” exclaimed Catherine.

This perhaps did not need to be stated aloud, for the situation was rather clear to everyone, but her younger siblings took up this cry with a dedication they seldom shewed for the lessons they were supposed to repeat.

Henry was a kind and considerate gentleman, and moved at once to seize his dog by the scruff and pull him away. Sampson could not bear to be parted from his tasty new friend so easily. Catherine was forced to seize Sampson by his long, untrimmed locks as well, for there to be any effect but the continuing screams of the man who was not actually a hedge root. Even then, Sampson dragged the man’s coat and sleeve halfway down the man who was not actually a hedge root’s spindly arm, revealing strange blue dots, crosses, and circles.

“IT IS A PIRATE!” shrieked the youngest Morland. How a pirate should make it so far inland as Wiltshire was a mystery.

“No, blockhead,” cried the second youngest. “It is a fairy! You must not eat anything he gives you! Make sure Sampson doesn’t eat any of him!”

“We are trying to!” Catherine exclaimed, very much vexed, as she often was, at having six younger siblings.

“Sampson, drop it!” commanded Henry.

Sampson sulkily obeyed.

Catherine dragged the dog back and, kneeling in the road, put her arms about his neck. “Bad Sampson,” she said, affectionately.

“Please accept my apologies,” Henry began.

“Two magicians shall appear in England,” wheezed the man who was not actually a hedge root, “the first shall fear me; the second shall ignore me—”

“Quite so,” said Henry. “Cathy, give me your kerchief, will you? Sampson's broken the skin on this man's arm.”

Catherine passed it over with a pang, for it was one of her new ones, purchased but three months ago in Bath. She was rather relieved to see the man who was not actually a hedge root wave it away, drawing his bloodied arm to his chest.

The man continued, “The first shall be governed by thieves and murders; the second shall be unable to save himself. The first shall bury his heart in a dark wood beneath the snow yet still feel its ache; the second shall be so transformed he will not know himself.”

“That’s all very well, but you are bleeding, sir,” said Henry. “If you will allow me—”

“I shall not allow a magician to touch me,” said the man who was not actually a hedge root, which only confirmed to the little Morlands that he was a fairy.

“Mr. Tilney is a clergyman, not a magician,” said Catherine.

“Yes, I have a profession already and I am loathe to quit it after all the fuss of university and ordination,” agreed Henry. “I should hate to have wasted all that effort. I think you have mistook me for someone else, my good man.”

“This is the place I saw in my dream,” insisted the man. “And you and the young lady were there. And look—” he pointed to the hedge where lately he had been lying. “There is a raven.”

The raven cocked its head, seeming a little offended to have been addressed.

“You have been chosen,” said the person all   Morlands and Tilneys present had concluded was a madman.

“Well,” said Henry Tilney, “I am very flattered to be the choice of whoever it is ordains magicians—”

“The Raven King,” whispered Catherine.

Her fiancé ignored this prompt, continuing on, “But I shall have the right of refusal. I decline. You had better chuse someone else.”

“ _I_ did not chuse you, Magician!”

“The Raven King did,” said Catherine, in louder, more exasperated tones.

Henry ignored the Raven King as irrelevant to his current problem: to whit, the madman currently raving at his eighteen-year-old fiance and her younger siblings, and the fact that said madman had been very thoroughly bitten by Sampson.

“You were chosen long ago,” said the madman, looking straight at Henry.

“The length of the attachment is of course flattering, but I must decline.” Henry then attempted to reason with the man, or at least treat such an unreasonable announcement as ‘you are a magician’ to a reasonable objection. “You see, my good man, I only know how to make sermons and read from the Book of Common Prayer. I do not know how to make magic, or read from any spellbook.”

The madman paused. He looked as if he was prepared to concede that this might be a legitimate obstacle to Henry’s becoming a great magician. Happily the solution occurred to him immediately; he stuck his hand into the breast of his coat and pulled out some sheets of paper with bits of straw sticking to them. “I have some spells!”

“Of course you do,” said Henry.

By this time, the magistrate of the parish had come and named the madman a vagrant, set on menacing the local clergyman’s children and the vagrant must be put in the county jail at once.

The Morland children quite liked this idea and ran wild with it, declaring that if Cathy’s beau had not been there, they should all have been murdered at once. Only Mr. Tilney’s setting his dog on the vagrant had saved them from the most gruesome and terrible deaths.

“No, no,” said the much exasperated Mr. Tilney. “A misunderstanding. There is no need for all this. My young relations here have let their imaginations run quite wild.”

“Then the dog attacked this man without provocation?” the magistrate shook his head. “We shall have to put it down.”

Catherine hugged Sampson tightly. “Oh no! Not at all. Sampson would never hurt anybody, it is only that this man—”

“Vinculus,” supplied the man.

“—this man advanced so suddenly on Mr. Tilney! You cannot blame a dog for defending its master!”

The magistrate turned to Vinculus.

Vinculus looked down at his bloody sleeve.

“You were about to sell me some spells, I think,” said Henry, hastily. “How much for them, Mr. Vinculus?”

“Seven and sixpence.”

Henry dug into his pocket, feeling sour. Seven and sixpence seemed a great deal to preserve the life of a dog that was, after all, only doing its duty, but he loved his many dogs, and probably would have paid half his current fortune to extend the lifespan of Sampson, who was his particular favorite. Vinculus took the seven and sixpence with a pleased air, and agreed that it was all a misunderstanding. Henry put the spells into his pocket and thought no more of them until after dinner.

Mr. and Mrs. Morland had been unusually indulgent this visit, in allowing the young people of Fullerton to play parlor games after the coffee had been served, and Henry had very much cheated at Blind Man’s Bluff, by pursuing Catherine to the exclusion of all other guests. He caught her up in his arms and was very long in feeling her face and hair, pretending to be unable to tell it was her, when all knew, including himself, that she had been his only object.

When it came Catherine’s turn, she had no such pretense. She seized him about the waist before he could contort out of her grip and she exclaimed at once, “Mr. Tilney! I know I have got Mr. Tilney!”

Henry was flattered and delighted by this, and still too newly (and somewhat clandestinely) engaged _not_ to enjoy the feel of Catherine’s arms about him. Still, archness was his resting state. He pitched his voice to a high falsetto, and imitated Catherine’s next eldest sister, “Oh la, Cathy! I am not Mr. Tilney!”

“You are!” exclaimed Catherine, starting to laugh.

Henry tried then to imitate the broad West Country accent of Mr. Morland‘s curate. “Oi be not ‘Enry Tilney, Miss Morland! ”

“How can you be so strange? I know you are Henry Tilney.”

“Nae mum, ye have grabbed upon a traveling Scotsman—”

Catherine burst out laughing and said, “You are Henry Tilney. I would know you anywhere.”

Few men could fail to be moved by such a declaration, or such tender and heartfelt accents in which they were uttered. Henry certainly was not. He said. “You have got me, Miss Morland.”

She raised the cloth from about her eyes and beamed up at him.

There came a noisy clamor for him to claim his forfeit. Henry looked down at Catherine’s flushed smiling face, and leaned down to kiss her. It felt as natural as smiling when he was happy, and he admitted to himself the wish that he be allowed to kiss her whenever he liked. If only his father, the General, would be less intransigent— if only he would give his permission— ah! How sweet it would be, to be married to Catherine, to kiss her whenever he wished.

To his amusement and bemusement, Catherine responded to his kiss not with longing, or equal melancholy over their circumstances, but with a, “What is in your pocket?”

Henry reached in and pulled out the spells.

This sent Catherine’s younger siblings into peals of laughter and the story had to be got into and explained.

“No doubt this man you found under a hedge and who startled your dog sold you very ancient spells,” said Mr. Morland, much amused.

“So you would think, sir, from all the dirt,” said Henry, trying to shake some of them off. “But this one is dated 2nd February 1808.”

“Only two weeks ago?” asked Catherine, disappointed.

“Ancient,” said Henry, cheerfully. “Let us see... I have three spells, two of which are to make an obstinate man leave London, and one to discover what my enemy is doing presently.”

Catherine leaned over his shoulder to read the latter. He could feel the warmth of her against his side, could smell the pomade she used to keep her curls, and longed intensely for her; but, all he could offer was, “Well, we are too far from London for the first two to be of any interest. Shall we try the third?”

Catherine lit up. Though her passion for Gothic novels had somewhat abated, she had still spent the past three years of her life glutting herself upon them, and the fifteen years before that devouring every Faerie tale that came her way. Magic still brought out in her a strain of undimmed enthusiasm, untainted by adult disappointment. “Oh let us! Pray let us!”

“Oh but that will not work,” said one of the local youths, whose name Henry always forgot. “I cannot imagine Mr. Tilney has any enemies.”

Henry and Mr. Morland exchanged a look; Mr. Moreland said, kindly, “Perhaps we had best not attempt it.”

The younger Morlands let out such an outcry, and Catherine so shrank into herself, embarrassed, Henry was moved to say, “If you do not object, sir, it shall only take half-a-minute. I need a mirror and some dead flowers.”

The little Morlands took apart the stillroom and returned with a bowl of potpourri, and Catherine and Mrs. Morland took down a small, round mirror from the entry hall. Henry arranged the flowers about it with utter solemnity, which amused the whole party. “Now,” he said, as dramatically as David Garrick pretending to be Hamlet, “I draw a circle upon the mirror with my finger, and quarter it... like... so!” He shook back the linen cuff of his sleeve and then struck the mirror thrice.

Everyone crowded about.

To Henry’s utter shock, in the mirror there was an image of a room, but it was not the parlor of Fullerton Parsonage. It was a small room, furnished not extravagantly, but very well. The ceiling— which was high— gave the idea of its being a small apartment within a large and perhaps rather grand house. There were books all about and a man at a desk. Henry felt the blood drain from his face and for an awful moment was sure he was looking in Northanger Abbey, seeing his father at work. But the image sharpened, turned clearer.

It was not his father.

Henry was both surprised and relieved by this.

Instead it was a man of about fifty, in a gray coat and an old-fashioned wig. Man, coat, and wig were all unknown to Henry.

“Who is it?” Catherine asked. "I am sure I have never seen him before in my life. Papa, do you recognize the man? No? What of you, Mr. Allen?"

But no one recognized him.

“D’ye owe any bank money, Mr. Tilney?” asked the curate. “It looks like a banker.”

“Mr. Tilney,” said Catherine, eyes wide. “I think you are a magician.”

“If I am, I am not a very good one.” Henry looked down at the surface of the mirror, troubled, but tried to joke himself out of his unease. “Other adepts summon up fairy-spirits and long-dead kings. I conjure bankers.”


	2. The Magician’s Spellbook

Upon discovering he could perform magic, Henry Tilney decided it was some sort of fluke and put it out of his mind. It was only at a particularly low ebb, when he was missing Catherine most, and doubted if he would be able to marry before his father died, that Henry went into his study for the book of spells he had inherited from his mother.

The late Mrs. Tilney had been born into a family from the North of England, and had been fond of Faerie stories, to the point where they permeated every part of her life and her schedule. She had raised her three children on Faerie stories, though only Henry and his sister Eleanor had liked them beyond the nursery. She had always left the morning’s first milk out in bowls, for any fairy who happened to stop by. (Henry left out milk as well, to attract cats rather than fairies. One good mouser, he had often observed, did more good to a family than any fairy might.) And it had been her hobby to collect spells and try them, though she had never successfully cast a single one in her fifty-odd years of life.

Henry had taken his mother’s spellbook from the library at Northanger in a fit of sentimentality and had not looked at it in years. He spent some time reading the front page, enjoying the long list of Annes, Eleanors, Elizabeths, and Catherines, with all the creative spellings of ‘her book,’ after them. Henry began to feel that the book really ought to have gone to Eleanor, but she had no interest in magic, and she had other things to remember their mother by.

“It isn’t even really a proper book of magic,” Henry said, leafing through the pages. It was not a printed book; it had begun life a journal full of blank pages, and some very ancient ancestor, whose surname was no longer heard in any English hall, had begun by setting down domestic spells she found useful. She had passed it on to her daughter, and her daughter had passed it onto her daughter and so forth, ‘til there were about three centuries of annotated, corrected, and crossed out spells, contained within the battered leather covers; a brief history of the otherwise unseen work of women. At the back there were about ten blank pages, after his mother’s last spell, ‘To remove a Blight from Roses, given me by the Countess Spencer.’ and her note, ‘I do not know why I keep collecting these, when none of them work.’

“I suppose everyone needs a hobby, mother,” said Henry. He browsed through the others, chuckling at how some ancestor of his had crossed out a receipt ‘For ye goodlye increase of Chekyns,’ and writ over it, ‘the worst in ye worlde!!!’ and settled on a receipt he thought Catherine might like: ‘To bottle up a Fyne Springg Daye.’

It was March, but felt like late April. Henry sincerely doubted he could bottle up the various atmospheric conditions that lead to its being so, but doing this sort of magic, following these handwritten receipts, made him feel closer to all the absent but well-loved ladies of his life. With Sampson, and two of his three terriers at his heels, he strode into the garden.

The spell was not difficult. He liberated “a bottyle of greene Glasse, mayd in England,” from his kitchen and walked clockwise, picking some fresh growing thing, every three steps. These he dropped into the mouth of the bottle, and when he had completed his circle, he spoke some grammatically incorrect Latin over the whole, and stoppered the bottle with ‘a Corke of Lisbon make,’ (technically of Opporto make, but a later ancestor had written in the margin, ‘a good Corke from a Port bottle maye alsso be used’). He sent it to Catherine, with his love, but then grew concerned that he had sent his fiancé a bottle full of grass clippings.

It was a good thing for a man to send his beloved the products of his garden, but generally this took the form of ‘fruit baskets’ or ‘bouquets of flowers.’ Henry repeated the spell and meant to try it out himself, but, as he was running late, took it to a dinner party to which he had been invited, to better keep an eye on it.

His host, the principal inhabitant of the village of Woodston, assumed Henry had brought a bottle of port and uncorked it shortly after the ladies retired from the table, and the men were passing about cigars and pipe tobacco. All were astonished to find themselves suddenly smoking in the ornamental park outside the parsonage. They were still in their chairs, the table was still before them, but instead of walls they saw Henry’s low shrubberies, and in the distance, his house. They were all much amazed by this and got up and moved about, but they never seemed to leave the spot of ground Henry had circled when casting his spell, nor did they walk into any walls.

After about an hour the illusion faded; the walls returned, and many bad jokes were made about the potency of Mr. Tilney’s bottle.

Henry himself was shaken. He had not really expected the spell to work. The next day he received a letter from Catherine, assuring him the spell he had sent her worked as well:

‘Dear Henry,

What a magnificent present! It was the sweetest day you sent me, so fresh and pretty, and I could imagine being in the park with you and Sampson, and Belinda, Blanche, and Billy.’ (These were his terriers.) ‘We had no notion how it would work, however, and I uncorked it in Mama’s sitting room. Everyone was very much astonished to find themselves outside, in the sun, when it had been raining these four days and more. It made us all very merry, and tho Mama was at first alarmed, once the spell faded and the walls all came back and stopped being hedges and things, Mama said to send you her her particular thanks, for it has kept all the little ones from going stir-crazy. Papa was v. impressed and said he hoped you might bottle another for him, if it was not very much trouble, for it would be of great use to him, when he is visiting Mrs. Barbour, who is very sickly and cannot rise from her bed. It is of great torment to her, for she was a great walker in her youth, and all she has of nature now is the view from her window. Dearest Henry, I wish I could bottle up all the love I have and send it to you, but all I have is a bottle of lavender water that did not turn out as well as I had hoped. I think it is because I wandered away in the middle of making it. But here it is, with all my love.

Yrs ever,

Catherine Morland.’

Henry liked the bottle Catherine sent him more than he liked his own efforts, for though the scent faded very quickly, he knew she had chosen lavender because it was a flower that symbolized devotion, and because he knew she had made it all herself. There was no strangeness in its production, only the observable work of her hands— her easily distracted hands, true, but her hands nonetheless.

For a day or two, Henry mused over his success with the spell. Once he could explain away as a fluke, but twice? To twice cast a spell and have the same effect? He tried it a third time and sent the bottle to his sister Eleanor, with a note saying, ‘Do you ever recall Mother’s spells working? For they seem to be working now.’

Henry waited impatiently for his sister’s reponse. He was much astonished when the next day, his father and his sister clattered up his drive in a chaise and four.

“Henry,” said the General, in a frankly bewildering good mood, “Capitol. Excellent.”

Henry did not know what to say to this. He looked to Eleanor.

As the least liked of General Tilney’s three children, they had developed a full vocabulary of glances and looks, capable of conveying everything from ‘you are using the wrong soup spoon’ to ‘mother died last night.’ Today her look said, ‘hear him out.’ And at Henry’s look of inquiry, the subtle shift of her expression and the tilt of her head hinted that the breach might be mended; and that permission to marry Catherine Morland could be granted.

“Sir, you do me honor,” said Henry, with a bow. “Will you come in?”

He shooed the dogs away, begged the servant to bring up the best of everything, and flung himself into the dining parlor to very hastily clean it. Everything was in tolerable order— save Blanche’s attempting to sit in one of the chairs— by the time General Tilney entered. He looked about, made his criticisms, asked why Henry had picked the wallpaper he had, grunted at this reasoning and said, “I heard you are become a magician?”

Henry glanced at Eleanor.

‘It could not be avoided,’ her look said; though she spoke aloud, “I am afraid that when I opened your present in the breakfast parlor, it caused some great alarm yesterday.”

“Ah,” said Henry. “It was an old spell of mother’s.”

“And yet she could never get them to work,” said General Tilney. The servant came with a tea tray and the ham meant to be Henry’s supper. The General partook of the ham very gravely and at length pronounced it tolerable. Henry and Eleanor fell back into the habits of their strained childhood, and waited in quiet tension until he was satisfied.

“I wonder, Henry, if you have heard of Mr. Norrell?”

“Sir Walter Pole’s doctor?” asked Henry.

“Sir Walter Pole’s magician,” corrected General Tilney. “You no doubt heard him talked of as a veritable magician for curing Lady Pole, and thought this a metaphor, but no indeed, he is really, and truly, a practical magician. He created an illusion for us, ships made of rain, to frighten the French.” General Tilney eyed Henry speculatively. Henry felt faint prickings of anxiety at the back of his neck. All his life he had been the spare, destined to be a clergyman, to be kept safely in reserve should anything happen to Frederick. It was safer to be unobserved. It only ever meant bad things if he was the object of some scheme of his father’s.

“Have you met Mr. Norrell, father?” asked Eleanor.

“Yes, and found him a very weak, wanting man. There was talk at Horse Guards of sending him to assist General Sir Arthur Wellesley in Spain— you know Sir Arthur, of course? Brother to the Earl of Mornington?”

“Yes,” said Henry cautiously, “I have made Sir Arthur’s acquaintance before. A friend of mine, the Earl of Matlock’s second son—”

“Ah yes,” interrupted General Tilney. “Colonel Fitzwilliam is on Sir Arthur’s staff. But to return to Mr. Norrell— such a man cannot be sent to Spain. He would be worse than useless. He would be a hindrance. And yet—to have a magician on the front lines....”

Henry began to see what his father expected of him, and was not terrifically pleased by it.

“You will oblige me, Henry,” said General Tilney, “in casting another spell from your mother’s book.”

Henry did not want to be a magician. He did not want to go to Spain. He therefore picked ‘For ye goodlye increase of Chekyns.’ This required them all to go out to his chicken coop, and dunk a chicken who really did not wish to be dunked into a silver basin filled with equal parts rainwater, riverwater, and wellwater, and then sprinkled with the crushed leaves of bay and oak. Henry had been hoping that nothing would happen but the chicken suddenly swelled to the size of a horse.

“BA-BOCK!” thundered out the horse-sized chicken.

Chickens are not intelligent creatures, and are not well fitted to adapt or accept any change. The fact that it was now a hundred times its usual size terrified the chicken out of its tiny mind. It began rampaging about the farmyard, issuing sounds shrill enough to split the eardrums of everyone in the parish.

Eleanor quite wisely ran from it; and the General and all the servants took cover behind whatever they could. The terriers bravely began nipping at its feet, which held the chicken in place long enough for Henry to fetch his gun. He shot it in the head.

It was disastrously messy.

Eleanor was sick, and Henry himself regretted eating as much ham as he had.

“Let me see that,” said General Tilney, snatching Mrs. Tilney’s book from where Henry had left it on a bench. “Ah. I see. Some half-literate woman of the Elizabethean era has provided your spell. Lack of books, no doubt, lack of books. That is the only problem.”

It was on the tip of Henry’s tongue to say that the giant rampaging chicken had also been a problem, but before he could, General Tilney said, “I see you must go to London, Henry, and avail yourself of Mr. Norrell’s library.”

“Forgive me sir,” said Henry, flatly, “but I think the fault lies not in the text but the reader. This—” gesturing at the giant feathery corpse taking up his entire farmyard “—ought not to be a repeat occurrence.”

“And it will not be,” said General Tilney, “once you have got some proper books.”

“Sir, you may be a kind enough father to ignore my clear lack of talent, but I have no inclination to be a magician—”

“If you go,” interrupted the general, “I will give you permission to throw yourself away on Miss Morland.”

Henry looked to Eleanor, who was picking straw out of her hair. Her look conveyed that General Tilney was in earnest.

Henry bowed. “As you wish, sir.”


	3. A Magician In Spite of His Best Efforts

Two weeks later, Henry found himself in Fullerton, before the altar, listening to his future father-in-law read out the ceremony. Henry had always liked the particular poetry of this part of the book of common prayer. 

“Wilt thou have this woman to thy wedded wife, to live together after God's ordinance in the holy estate of Matrimony? Wilt thou love her, comfort her, honour, and keep her in sickness and in health; and, forsaking all other, keep thee only unto her, so long as ye both shall live?” It was asked very kindly; Henry felt heartened at the tone, which implied that Mr. Morland truly believed Henry would do all this. 

“I will,” said Henry.

Catherine listened very gravely as her father asked her, “Wilt thou have this man to thy wedded husband, to live together after God's ordinance in the holy estate of Matrimony? Wilt thou obey him, and serve him, love, honour, and keep him in sickness and in health; and, forsaking all other, keep thee only unto him, so long as ye both shall live?”

Her “I will,” was serious and very confident.

Mr. Morland paused, and stared at his book, for this was usually the point where the father give his daughter’s hand to the groom, but his hands were full of the Book of Common Prayer.

Catherine, seeing this, fumbled her bouquet over to her eldest sister and merely took Henry’s right hand in hers. 

“Well, that’s that,” said Mr. Morland. “Cathy always did know what she wanted.” 

There was a ripple of good-natured laughter from the assembled company.

Henry couldn’t resist the impulse to wink at her.

Catherine blushed and bit her lips to keep from laughing. 

“Now Cathy, repeat after me.”

Catherine really had no need to, for she had heard this service so many times in her life, and agreed clearly and sincerely to have and hold Henry from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death did them part, according to God's holy ordinance; and thereto she plighted him her troth. 

Henry swore likewise, and produced the ring. He was for a moment briefly worried that he had chosen wrongly, and picked something Catherine would dislike, but she beamed at him when he held it over her ring finger. “With this ring,” he said, raising his eyes to meet hers, “I thee wed, with my body I thee worship, and with all my worldly goods I thee endow: In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.”

“Amen,” Catherine breathed. 

As they were signing the guest registry, Catherine held out her ring for her father and their witnesses—Eleanor, and Catherine’s eldest brother James—to admire.

“Careful there, Mrs. Tilney,” said Henry, catching the edge of her very long green shawl and its paisley border. “As soon as I give you a wedding present you neglect to care for the engagement present I got you.”

“I am just not used to the length of it,” said Catherine, frankly, trying to assist him in tucking it about her elbows. “It is so elegant though, Henry! However did you know I wanted a shawl like this?”

“I know you, Cathy,” he said, smiling. “And I also know Mrs. Caterhaugh’s Janet goes about in a shawl just like it as she rushes about the castle in Faerie, in which she is trapped.”

There was a polite titter at this from all assembled; Catherine blushed self-consciously.

“Every woman in London has them, Catherine,” said Eleanor, smilingly. “There is no need to be embarrassed, my dear sister.”

Henry kissed Catherine’s blushing cheek. “None at all, my love. I have read  _ Janet  _ more times than you have, I daresay.”

“Perhaps you might know then, just how Janet manages to run quite so much while keeping her shawl clutched to her breast,” said Catherine. “I only move my arm a very little and it trails on the floor.”

“How on earth will you sign the registry?” Henry asked, in mock concern. “Cathy, dearest Cathy, do not tell me we shall not be wed after all!”

“It is your own fault if we are not,” said Catherine, trying to match his tone. “For you gave it me to begin with. Although....” She pulled the hanging ends of her shawl aside, and up to her heart with her left hand and bent carefully to pick up her pen and sign a neat, ‘Catherine Morland.’ “I suppose Janet knew what she was about after all. There really is no way she could run  _ without  _ clutching it to her breast.”

Henry laughed and bent to sign his own name. 

“There,” said Mr. Morland. “You are married in the eyes of God  _ and  _ man. I am so very pleased for you both.”

“Thank you, Mr. Morland,” said Henry, shaking his hand. 

“You’re a good lad,” said Mr. Morland, squeezing his hand. “And thank you for all those bottled spring days. They have done such good already. Now, let us to the wedding breakfast.”

It was difficult, squeezing everyone into the parsonage, and Henry’s father walked about the crowded rooms with a critical eye, dispensing pained compliments about the well-worn furniture, the number of children, the green slope at the back of the house which ought to have been modified into something better, etc. Frederick had shown up, though mostly to be bored and superior and Eleanor very kindly volunteered to distract him. This did leave the General free to make the remarks he thought appropriate to the newlyweds.

After enduring this and a strained, “Congratulations are in order,” Henry decided he was now free to ignore his father and instead enjoy his new family. All Catherine’s younger siblings were wild for him to do magic for them; and Henry found a spell in his mother’s book, “For to turne Herbes of Alle Sortes unto sugar” and kept cutting violets and clovers with an iron knife (“of Englysshe make”), tossing the fresh-cut wildflowers into the air three times, while thinking a silly couplet, and then catching the new, spun-sugar versions. He was immensely popular with all the children present. 

“Henry,” said the General, seeing him at this work, “is this the proper use of your talents?”

“I am practicing, merely,” said Henry. “I would not wish to shame you with unskilled work before Mr. Norrell.”

The General saw the sense in this, or at least, the appeal to worse loss of dignity made him resigned to Henry’s little tricks and he allowed Frederick to pull him away to complain about Wiltshire comfortably indoors. 

“I think it’s wonderful,” said Catherine, hotly, though only after the General had gone back into the house. “What good is human magic, unless it is for doing kind things for people? In everything I have read it’s... it’s  _ their _ \--” meaning the Fair Folk “--magic that is unkind and makes people hungry or unhappy or lost to themselves.”

Mr. Morland was out with them and had observed this scene with a troubled air. He put his hand on Henry’s shoulder and said, “Indeed, did not our Savior say, suffer the little children to come unto me? And did he not multiply the loaves and fishes? Henry, know that your instincts are true. General Tilney’s opinion is just that, his opinion. We have taken an oath to help our fellow creatures, more than other men, and so you have done with the spells you have cast.”

“I thank you, sir,” said Henry, recovering from the oppression of spirits that were the customary effect of his father’s presence. “Catherine, I know it has taken you a great deal of time to learn to love a hyacinth. Perhaps I might hasten your ability to love roses if I make you one of spun-sugar?”

“Oh yes, I should like it above all things,” said Catherine, beaming at him. “Henry, you are the sweetest man.”

“Only because I have learnt to turn herbs of all sorts into sugar,” quipped Henry. 

“No,” said Catherine, with her usual frankness. “You were the same before you learnt magic, Henry. It is who you are as a person.” She slid her hand into his, causing her shawl to slide down her forearm and tangle about their hands. Henry held tight to her, feeling anchored once more into himself, to the sort of person he knew himself to be, and bent to kiss her forehead while presenting her with the rose.

“Not fair, Cathy has a rose and a bud,” exclaimed one of the younger Morlands. “Cathy’s married to you, you don’t need to give her  _ two  _ flowers.”

“No, I think it all the more reason,” said Henry, letting the joy of being married thrill through him. “Mrs. Tilney must always have the double rose out of the bouquet.”

Catherine probably would have laughed in pleasure at this, but she was too busy eating her rose. But once she had done and everyone returned indoors for wedding cake, she remained rooted to the spot.

He looked down quizzically at her, and Catherine pulled him to her. At first Henry wished to laughingly attribute the sweetness of her kiss to the sugar still upon her lips, but as the kiss went on, the impulse to joke faded. It was sweet because it was Catherine. It proved her point more effectively than Henry quite knew how to acknowledge, and all he could do was kiss her with increased tenderness. 

They were still learning how to embrace each other with all the liberties a married couple might take, so it was a bit awkward when Henry tried to put his hands to her hips and Catherine didn’t know what he was doing and thought her shawl had fallen again, but they had a whole, glorious two weeks together to learn this before they were required to go to London. Henry had decided on taking a very slow journey to London, stopping at every Gothic cathedral and ruined castle and fairy ring on the way. Catherine was gratifyingly interested in sketching these places and adding to them amusing little cartoons of people shocked by the gargolyes, getting into fistfights with fairies, or tripping over ruined bits of wall (Henry found a spell to make them move, which Catherine loved), but she was much more interested in returning to the inns with him. She would rather study him than architecture, until their excited ignorance and mutual, awkward eagerness became familiarity and more skillful displays of passion. To have and to hold him, however she could, was now her chief joy in life. 

Henry had always considered himself a very rational, perhaps even cynical man, but he felt almost out of his senses with love—and yet, how could he be out of his senses when Catherine so filled them? And yet he was not frightened of this infatuation. He knew that after the elation of being newlyweds faded, he would always reach for Catherine as he would reach for all that was best in life, and she would do the same. Their long engagement had been good for that, at least. 

They arrived in London, at the family townhouse in Hanover Square, a few days before the General arrived and Henry delighted in showing Catherine, who had never been to London, what he knew she would enjoy: the Tower, Vauxhall, the theatre. Henry delighted in these places anew in hearing not her appreciation for them, precisely, but her unintentionally hilarious observations of how they fit, or failed to fit the descriptions of them in books, or how she imagined them to be.

But to every thing there is a season—and the honeymoon must end and the clouds gather in. 

With the arrival of General Tilney in London, there came almost an atmospheric change.  A palpable air of gloom and anxiety fell over the whole house, from the boots boy up to Henry himself. 

“Hm,” said General Tilney, observing Henry and Catherine closely, as the butler took his greatcoat. “Which maid has been attending you, Mrs. Tilney?”

Catherine put a hand to her hair, which was prettily but simply curled, threaded through with ribbon, and looked down at her blue muslin daygown, unsure what had offended. “The head parlormaid, sir, but this—this is a relatively new gown. Mrs. Allen had it made for me in Bath.”

“Yes, but you have rounds of visits to make in  _ London _ , Mrs. Tilney,” said General Tilney, with the appearance of good-humor. To Eleanor, he said, “Speak to the housekeeper about getting Mrs. Tilney her own maid. A French maid, one who knows her business. And once you have washed off the dust from the road, perhaps you might take your new sister to Madame Devy’s, so that she might be properly attired.” He observed Catherine critically. “My daughter, you see, wears only white. I believe it to be the fashion for gowns at present.”

After flinging on bonnet, gloves and spencer, and bestowing a hasty kiss on Henry, Catherine fled the oppression of Tilney House for the easier atmosphere of Bond Street. Henry was glad to see Catherine and Eleanor escape, and gladder still to see Eleanor smiling at the thought of new finery, and of spending time with her good friend, but he felt a terrible sense of foreboding for himself. 

“Mr. Norrell,” said the General, greatly displeased, “or rather one of his nursemaids, a Mr. Lascelles, writes that there cannot possibly be two magicians. He is refusing to meet you. You, a Tilney of Northanger Abbey!”

Henry was not displeased with this turn of events but knew not to say as much and agreeing to go on a walk with his father seemed a very small sacrifice to make in comparison to avoiding doing magic. His father’s steps turned naturally to Whitehall. Henry did not think much of it until they walked into the building and Henry realized they had been marching into battle. 

“Here we are,” said General Tilney, putting a hand on Henry’s shoulder and steering him towards the well-known figure of Colonel Fitzwilliam. The colonel was busily writing in a little notebook, and then shut it to stride after a handsomely uniformed man with a long, aquiline nose, and eyes of a very piercing blue. 

“Sir Arthur!”

This first man paused and turned. “Is that General Tilney?” Then, seeing it was, came forward with hand outstretched. “General Tilney, sir! How are you? I hear your younger son is lately married and turned magician? Busy few weeks for him.”

“Indeed,” said General Tilney, shaking Sir Arthur’s hand. “This is the younger son you were so kind as to mention— Henry. Henry, this is our commander of the force destined for the Peninsula this August, Lieutenant-General Sir Arthur Wellesley. We saw good service together in India.”

Henry felt about seven years old again, scrubbed to pinkness and brought down from the schoolroom to make his bow to his father’s guests after dinner. He made a much better bow now than he had then, however.

“You gentlemen both know my newest aide-de-camp, Colonel Fitzwilliam?” asked Sir Arthur, gesturing behind him.

“They are old playfellows, Sir Arthur,” said General Tilney, genially. “Lady Matlock—” this being Colonel Fitzwilliam’s late mother “—was a schoolfriend of my wife’s, God rest their souls.”

“I heard you were in London and have been meaning to come by and see if you had exaggerated the charms of your wife,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam, sticking his notebook into his pocket and his pencil behind his ear before extending a hand to Henry. They clasped hands warmly. “How are you, Henry?”

“Tolerably well, I thank you, and yourself?”

“Sir Arthur keeps me flying back and forth from supply depots and barracks to Whitehall, and my father to all the relations I probably will not see for some time, now we are to Portugal in August,” said Colonel Fitzwilliam. “I am constantly on the wing these days.” 

“The provosts as provoking as ever?” asked General Tilney.

“Ha,” said Sir Arthur. This, as Colonel Fitzwilliam later told Henry, was a noise Sir Arthur often made, which revealed nothing except that he had heard the speaker.

“I may be of assistance in terms of supplying your men, Sir Arthur,” said General Tilney. “My son, as you heard, is now the second practical magician England has seen in centuries.”

“Ha,” said Sir Arthur. After a moment, he turned to Henry. “I know in your profession—former profession?—it is well known that man cannot live on bread alone, but on the Word of God, but in mine, men have much more use for bread. Or—” looking intrigued “—can you do the magic Jesus did, and feed five thousand men on five loaves and two fish?”

“In a manner of speaking,” said Henry. “I can increase chickens to the size of horses.”

“Does it affect the taste at all?” asked Colonel Fitzwilliam, clearly startled.

“I am told not. I had not the courage to partake of it myself.”

Sir Arthur scrutinized Henry a moment and then smiled. It was a smile of unexpected charm, made the more so by the fact Sir Arthur’s usual air was one of sardonic reserve. “I daresay my men would like it much better if you could turn water to wine.”

“I have no spell for that, sir.”

“I am afraid that is the fault of Mr. Norrell,” said General Tilney. “He has bought up every book of magic in England. My son has made do with the few in our own library, but I do think, if he was given the proper materials, he would be of invaluable use. Henry, do your trick.”

Henry tried to protest, but ended up giving in, finding a tub of flowers growing outside, and turning one of the geraniums into spun-sugar. 

“Well, well,” said Sir Arthur, examining it. “You do seem a useful sort of fellow. We must see you are properly trained.”

Two days later, as Catherine was trying on the first of her white muslin gowns, the General sent up a maid. They were to call on Mr. Norrell. Now. 

Catherine was in a panic, as none of her new spencers or pelisses had yet arrived. Henry, knowing his father’s dislike of delay, bundled Catherine into her green shawl and out the door.

Mr. Norrell was a surprisingly small and fussy man, who still wore an unfortunate wig and knee breeches. Catherine, her hand tucked into the crook of Henry’s arm, regarded Mr. Norrell with quiet curiosity. Henry let his father do the talking and let his gaze wander about the library and rest frequently on Catherine. She still had the habit of wearing ribbon in her dark hair, as a sort of bandeaux, and Henry still found it charming. The ribbon now was a little askew, because of how hastily she had jammed her bonnet on her head, and Henry gently reached up to adjust it.

“I am not in the business, sir,” interrupted Mr. Norrell, querulously, “of taking on apprentices. I am sorry, I know Lord Mulgrave has infected all Whitehall with the desire to read magical histories and come up with all sorts of unfounded notions of how and when magic may be deployed, but I alone understand how magic may be worked in this century. If your son has a wish to be a magician, I can only advise the continuous study of books before he even considers practical magic.” 

“My husband is a clergyman,” said Catherine, a little confusedly. “Indeed, sir, he wants no other profession. It is only that he can do magic, and so... we have come to see you.”

There were two men with Mr. Norrell, though Henry had not paid enough attention to these men to recall their names. The one with pretensions to dandyism said, “Are you then capable of magic, Mr. Tilney? I should love to see a piece of magic performed. I am excessively fond of seeing magic done.”

General Tilney made an irritated noise, but said, “Henry. Take out your book.” 

Henry always kept his mother’s receipt book in his coat pocket and took it out.

Mr. Norrell looked startled. “That...  _ that  _ is your book, sir?”

Henry looked down at it. “Yes, sir.”

“May I...?”

Henry was loathe to part with it, but did not know how to politely refuse. Fortunately, Mr. Norrell looked distressed and pitying and handed it back. “No, no, copies of copies, by illiterates and uneducated women. You cannot possibly do magic with this.”

“I assure you he can,” said General Tilney, testily. “Pick any spell, sir.”

“These are not spells,” said Mr. Norrell, severely. “None of these would be found in Sutton-Grove.” He went to his desk and paged through a book before bringing it back. “Look at this, Mr. Tilney. This is a proper spell by Martin Pale.”

“A Spell to Make Stone Talk,” Henry read, and reluctantly released Catherine to take the book. It was much more complicated and used many more bits of magical equipment than he had ever used before, or had even known existed. “Yes, this does appear different from the magic I have worked. You are quite right, Mr. Norrell. I really cannot call myself a practical magician.”

Mr. Norrell looked very pleased with this.

Henry ventured to go a little farther and say, “Really, I am merely a clergyman, not—“

“Perhaps,” said General Tilney, in his usual, implacable way, “you would favor us with a demonstration, Henry, instead of raising the white flag so immediately.”

Henry sighed. “I do not know what half these magical implements are, sir. Every spell I have worked requires nothing more than may be found in any English kitchen.” 

Mr. Norrell looked better and better pleased. “There we have it. Mr. Tilney is  _ not  _ a magician. He cannot possibly be.”

“There we have it,” Henry echoed, much relieved. 

General Tilney took the Martin Pale book from Henry and flipped through the pages, stopping on the shortest spell. “Scrying. Try that.”

An ill-kempt servant Henry hadn’t noticed before came forward with a silver basin and filled it with water. Henry rearranged the flowers the servant brought and asked who he should look for. General Tilney suggested Sir Arthur, and Henry dutifully touched the surface of the water with his fingertip, drew a circle and then quartered it. The surface of the water shivered and then displayed an image of Sir Arthur flinging letters over his shoulders at his aides, clearly barking out responses. 

“Mr. Tilney has a talent,” said Mr. Norrell, surprised. 

“Oh yes indeed,” said Catherine, eagerly. “He bottled a spring day for me once. It was so fresh and pretty.”

General Tilney motioned for a footman to come forward, and he presented one of the bottles Henry had made for Mr. Morland’s housebound parishioners to Mr. Norrell. Mr. Norrell unstoppered the bottle and they were all suddenly in Henry’s garden again. Mr. Norrell panicked at first, wailing about his books, his library, his books! But General Tilney assured him that the spell lasted but half-an hour, with no damage done to the house itself, and Mr. Norrell was able to forget his panic in his interest in this new magic. 

“Sutton-Grove wrote nothing of this,” murmured Mr. Norrell, bending down to stare at the grass. He attempted to pluck a stalk of grass but each blade evaded his hand. “Fascinating. Truly fascinating!”

His two companions were gratifyingly amazed and kept wandering the room, blessing themselves and exclaiming over such a transformation. 

Mr. Norrell quizzed Henry on every particular of the spell, though Henry couldn’t have obliged him with the answers he wished for, even if Henry had wanted to be a magician and study with Mr. Norrell. He had no idea why it worked, any more than how cooking worked. One followed a receipt and it resulted in the thing one wished to create. 

By the time the library reappeared, Mr. Norrell appeared lost in thought and then said, “Yes... clearly this is the result of not having the correct plan of study. You have read no books, have you?”

“None on magic.”

Mr. Norrell looked pleased. “I must draw up a plan of study for you.”

“A little difficult, sir, when he has no books,” said General Tilney, pointedly.

Mr. Norrell looked torn and picked up a book and clutched it to his chest. But then an idea occurred to him, “Why then, you must spend your mornings here in my library, Mr. Tilney. I must teach you the  _ proper  _ way to do magic.” 

“Send for your dogs, Henry,” said General Tilney, rubbing his hands together once they had left the house. “And let me know of any Cambridge friend of yours in need of a curacy, whom you would trust to live at Woodston. You will be in London for the rest of the Season.” 

 


End file.
